A report ordered by the North Eastern Health Board into the death of a nine-year-old girl within weeks of her having an appendix operation at Cavan General Hospital has now been completed, it was confirmed yesterday.
The report looks at the circumstances surrounding the death of Frances Sheridan from Cootehill on February 1st, three weeks after her operation.
It also looks at all her dealings with the hospital from when she first presented for the operation on January 7th.
A post-mortem examination by State Pathologist Dr Marie Cassidy found that the child died from complications of recent surgery.
She had been recuperating at home when she experienced stomach pains on Friday, January 30th. She was brought back to the hospital and was seen in the casualty department, X-rayed and sent home as it was believed she was only suffering from a tummy bug.
She awoke on Sunday morning, February 1st, vomiting blood and an ambulance was called by her family. But she was dead before it had arrived.
The report ordered by the health board into her death was carried out by a four-person team: Mr Gerry Clerkin, risk adviser, Cavan/Monaghan Hospital Group; Mr Conor Egleston, A&E consultant at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, Drogheda; retired consultant paediatrician, Dr Brian McDonagh; and Ms Julie Sheridan, paediatric clinical nurse manager at Cavan hospital.
The report is understood to make a number of recommendations, details of which will be published shortly.
The health board, in a statement, confirmed that its assistant chief executive, Mr Tadhg O'Brien, had received the report.
"This is a detailed and comprehensive report which requires detailed consideration. The assistant CEO is now considering the report and will be submitting it to the CEO as soon as possible," it said.
"The media will be advised in due course of when the findings of the report will be made known," it added.
Frances Sheridan was treated at the hospital during a period when considerable concern was being expressed about the continuity of care which could be provided to patients in the absence of two of the hospital's three consultant surgeons. Dr Pawan Rajpal and Dr William Joyce had been suspended over interpersonal difficulties.
Last month Dr Rajpal succeeded in the High Court in having a decision of the Minister for Health in August 2003 to appoint a committee to inquire into his removal overturned. A ministerial inquiry is ongoing into the removal of Dr Joyce.
Meanwhile, the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland which had, at the request of the health board, begun looking at whether either of the surgeons could be redeployed to another hospital so as to bring an end to the difficulties between them, has now stopped doing so after it transpired neither surgeon wished to be transferred.